Budapest is the capital and the largest city of Hungary, and one of the largest cities in the European Union. It is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre,sometimes described as the primate city of Hungary.In 2011, according to the census, Budapest had 1.74 million inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2.1 million due to suburbanization.The Budapest Commuter Area is home to 3.3 million people.The city covers an area of 525 square kilometres within the city limits. Budapest became a single city occupying both banks of the river Danube with a unification on 17 November 1873 of west-bank Buda and Óbuda with east-bank Pest.The history of Budapest began with Aquincum, originally a Celtic settlement that became the Roman capital of Lower Pannonia.Hungarians arrived in the territory in the 9th century. Their first settlement was pillaged by the Mongols in 1241–42.The re-established town became one of the centres of Renaissance humanist culture in the 15th century.Following the Battle of Mohács and nearly 150 years of Ottoman rule, the region entered a new age of prosperity in the 18th and 19th centuries, and Budapest became a global city after the 1873 unification.It also became the second capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a great power that dissolved in 1918, following World War I. Budapest was the focal point of the Hungarian Revolution of 1848, the Hungarian Republic of Councils of 1919, Operation Panzerfaust in 1944, the Battle of Budapest in 1945, and the Revolution of 1956.Cited as one of the most beautiful cities in Europe,its extensive World Heritage Site includes the banks of the Danube, the Buda Castle Quarter, Andrássy Avenue, Heroes' Square and the Millennium Underground Railway, the second oldest in the world.Other highlights include a total of 80 geothermal springs,the world's largest thermal water cave system,second largest synagogue, and third largest Parliament building. The city attracts about 4.3 million tourists a year, making it the 25th most popular city in the world according to Euromonitor.Considered a financial hub in Central Europe,the city ranked 3rd on Mastercard's Emerging Markets Index,and ranked as the most livable Central/Eastern European city on EIU's quality of life index.It is also ranked as "the world's second best city" by Condé Nast Traveler,"Europe's 7th most idyllic place to live" by Forbes,and as the 9th most beautiful city in the world by UCityGuides.It is the highest ranked Central/Eastern European city on Innovation Cities' Top 100 index.Budapest is home to the headquarters of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology, and the first foreign office of the China Investment Promotion Agency.

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The Millennium Bridge, officially known as the London Millennium Footbridge, is a steel suspension bridge for pedestrians crossing the River Thames in London, linking Bankside with the City of London. It is sited between Southwark Bridge and Blackfriars Railway Bridge. The Millennium Bridge is owned and maintained by Bridge House Estates, a charitable trust overseen by the City of London Corporation. Construction of the bridge began in 1998, with the opening in June 2000.Londoners nicknamed the bridge the "Wobbly Bridge" after participants in a charity walk on behalf of Save the Children to open the bridge felt an unexpected and, for some, uncomfortable swaying motion on the first two days after the bridge opened. The bridge was closed later that day, and after two days of limited access the bridge was closed for almost two years while modifications were made to eliminate the wobble entirely. It reopened in 2002.The southern end of the bridge is near the Globe theatre, the Bankside Gallery and Tate Modern, the north end next to the City of London School below St Paul's Cathedral. The bridge alignment is such that a clear view of St Paul's south façade is presented from across the river, framed by the bridge supports.The design of the bridge was the subject of a competition organized in 1996 by Southwark council and RIBA Competitions. The winning entry was an innovative "blade of light" effort from Arup, Foster and Partners and Sir Anthony Caro. Due to height restrictions, and to improve the view, the bridge's suspension design had the supporting cables below the deck level, giving a very shallow profile. The bridge has two river piers and is made of three main sections of 81 metres, 144 metres and 108 metres with a total structure length of 325 metres; the aluminium deck is 4 metres wide. The eight suspension cables are tensioned to pull with a force of 2,000 tons against the piers set into each bank — enough to support a working load of 5,000 people on the bridge at one time.Ordinarily bridges across the River Thames require an Act of Parliament. For this bridge that was avoided by the Port of London Authority granting a licence for the structure and the obtaining of planning permissions from the City of London and London Borough of Southwark.Construction began in late 1998 and the main works were started on 28 April 1999 by Monberg & Thorsen and Sir Robert McAlpine.

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The Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians are a range of mountains forming an arc roughly 1,500 km long across Central and Eastern Europe, making them the second-longest mountain range in Europe. They provide the habitat for the largest European populations of brown bears, wolves, chamois and lynxes, with the highest concentration in Romania,as well as over one third of all European plant species.The Carpathians and their piedmont also concentrate many thermal and mineral waters, with Romania having over one-third of the European total.Romania is likewise home to the largest surface of virgin forests in Europe, totaling 250,000 hectares, most of them in the Carpathians,with the Southern Carpathians constituting Europe’s largest unfragmented forested area.The Carpathians consist of a chain of mountain ranges that stretch in an arc from the Czech Republic in the northwest through Slovakia, Poland, Hungary and Ukraine to Romania in the east and on to the Iron Gates on the River Danube between Romania and Serbia in the south. The highest range within the Carpathians is the Tatras, on the border of Poland and Slovakia, where the highest peaks exceed 2,600 m. The second-highest range is the Southern Carpathians in Romania, where the highest peaks exceed 2,500 m.The Carpathians are usually divided into three major parts: the Western Carpathians, the Central Carpathians, and the Eastern Carpathians.The most important cities in or near the Carpathians are: Bratislava and Košice in Slovakia; Kraków in Poland; Cluj-Napoca, Sibiu and Braşov in Romania; and Miskolc in Hungary.

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